Well the summer has come and gone. In my last email I had just started my summer job at the Christian Summer Camp called Calvin Crest. Things up here are going well and I'm looking forward to getting back to school. Surprising isn't it, wanting to go back to school. After having to clean up someone else's mess all summer I'm now happy about just worrying about cleaning up after myself(just a reminder I'm working on the Accommodations staff, which is basically the janitorial staff on the mountain. We clean everything and setup tables for dinner. Basically if it weren't for us all of programs would be non-existent). I realize that the responsibility and duty we have around can is very important. Therefore you can be easily stressed out by all the demands and workload. About week 4 of the summer I was feeling the burden of having everyone calling us up for special little things that needed to be done. Every time we got on of those calls I would think to myself, "Why can't you do it?". It was really annoying to have some people think, "oh, Accommodations can do this, so I don't have to." After about week 7 other staffs began to realize that they could help us by doing some clean up work too. One example is we set up tables and chairs for high school groups about twice a day. Now the High School staff helps up instead of sitting in their little corner talking to themselves. However one thing I don't understand is why the store clerks can't sweep or mop there own stores. The store clerks do have a high traffic area being the only place where people can get their sugar fix, but looking at their open hours, then the hours they spend prepping, it just seems... unfair. Seriously, if someone doesn't want to do something that is Accommodations related, default falls to us.

I know I'm complaining and I should be telling all the gross and interesting stores I've had up here but... its one the first things coming to mind when I think about my job. The sort of "unfairness" when it comes to work loaad. However Accommodations isn't the only one that has the short end of the stick. Kitchen staff and Maintenance also have a ... crappy job. Yes I said "crappy" (sorry mom) because one Kitchen had there sinks back up and that was fun to clean up. While maintenance has had to dig and install new leach lines for our septic system. So they can come to dinner smelling like ... well do I really need to say. So basically Maintenance, Kitchen, and Accommo are the main grunts of the camp while everyone else is doing there own thing. My boss warned me that this is a thankless job, that nobody rarely notices us until they need something, but they didn't tell me it would be this bad.

Anyway experiences and stories about came, hmmm... well there was this one time that a toilet was so clogged that... Maybe that isn't the best story. Oh there was this other time were we were cleaning the Sherwood Forest(area of camp for 4 to 6 graders) bathroom and this Huge, I mean HUGE... wait that isn't really appropriate either. You know all these stories that are coming to mind are stories that would be really really inappropriate. I can say for one thing, my definition of what is disgusting has been modified tremendously. Seriously I could walk into a gas-station bathroom and would not flinch. The only story that is coming to mind that does not involve human waste is... wow its hard to think of one. Oh I've got one, we were cleaning the girls bathrooms down in Sherwood and were complaining about how fast they went through toilet paper. So we all made a bet of how soon they would go through the next box of TP. And we were wrong by about 2 days, because we started the bet near the end of the week. So there was a space of about 24 hours that no one was using the bathrooms. So no one really won whatever we were betting. Another one was with Maintenance having to replace a tire on a van and having a truck die in the farthest program area away from camp and the time where the accommodations team just hung out on the lake drinking root beer and the other time where we had fun on the island on the lake and ... well I guess there are other stories besides the disgusting ones. But you think of the really bad stuff you had to deal with instead of all the other cool stuff you did.

A few other experiences I've had up here also took place down in Sherwood forest. The first is the multiple weeks I am the Sheriff of Nottingham. There is a little skit with Robin Hood, Maid Marian, and the Sheriff that helps act out the bible lesson they are learning for that week. The skit this year is really boring from what I remember as a kid with the sword fights, kidnapping, and driving bulldozers to turn the woods into a parking lot. This year the Sheriff can't find is purpose in the woods and takes all his frustrations out on everyone else trying to make them feel that they have no purpose as well. Its fun for me because I get to be a really creepy mean guy and everyone tells me that I am way too good in my performance; which they find scary. Seriously with the costume on I am very intimidating; then again if you were a kid who is just over four feet tall, a six foot tall mean person would be very frightening. Of course the Sheriff finds his purpose at the end of the week and the forest is at peace once more. I think it was last week were my church came up and was in Sherwood and I was invited to dinner... for the first time ever, and it was girls, Girls that invited me. I had fun, seriously the food was good the company was friendly, and the conversation was very lively. Besides feeling awkward when been "mob hugged" by 20 little girls I really liked feeling welcome in Sherwood instead of little kids brandishing sticks to beat me senseless. Seriously the boys are little monsters, at town meeting they started throwing rocks at me. I guess that means that I'm doing my job right for the Sheriff to be the bad guy. Another funny thing was one of the first weeks of Sherwood I played Sheriff I was found out. And what I mean was that they saw me cleaning the bathrooms. So in a matter of seconds it was all over Sherwood that the mean Sheriff of Nottingham was actually the janitor, it ruined my image for the rest of the week; as well as my ego; which is still a little bruise from begin called Sheriff the trash man; little kids are mean *tear*. Other fun times in the woods included Archery, going down a water slide into the pond, and climbing a Giant Sequiona tree stump. Good times, good times.

Now for completely different experience that took place in the Woods. There is a program that is called "Week in the Forest" which is a camp for mentally disabled adults. I was pulled to council because they were short on male counselors, females seem to more willing to volunteer these days (and I'm convinced that the hierarchy up here is sexiest; more on that later). One of the strongest memories during that week was cleaning a grown man in the shower that was more than twice my age. It just felt... wrong for me to do that, however it was some how right. I just felt really weird treating these adult like children. Did you brush your teeth? Did you go to the bathroom? Stop bothering Rodney, Jeff and James! Jose don't punch Josh that isn't nice. I knew when I came up here I didn't want to council. I'm bad with kids because the never seem to respect my authority as a councilor. The same thing happened here, I don't know why, but at least they listened to me when I told them to use the bathroom or else I would had to deal with soiled cloths in the middle of the night. I don't want to do an experience like this again I really don't have the patience. Its because everyday you had to deal with the same small problems that could have been solved yesterday, but they just don't remember. And some of the campers just, didn't learn anything. We had a camper, David, who loved the taste of dairy products, but he can't have them because he would have the runs. He would get violent when he couldn't have want he wanted. Seriously he liked someones shoes and tried to take them off someone's feet. He was really troublesome. Then there was another camper, Josh, how was a very sexually active and you had to keep an eye on him. Over all I didn't like the week and appreciate the experience. What I did get from it was that I now have huge respect for the people that go into that kind of work. I'm also very thankful that my family is not disabled in anyway. Either way I'm glad its over and I hope that I don't have to deal with this sort of thing in the future.
Okay here is the note on why I think the hierarchy of this camp is sexiest. The maintenance team which fixes cars, septic systems, eletrical problems and anything else has 6 males and 1 female. Accommodations has 8 females and 2 males. AIM(Assistance In Mission) has 2 female and 1 male staffers but the first week the program was operational it was all females and the one male staffer. AIM is a little different, we have high schoolers come up and work on different program teams learning what it is like to be on staff up at Calvin Crest. So that week we had about 20 female campers in the program after that first week its been about 1/3, male/female. Office staff that listens to phone calls from worried parents to check up on their kids to make sure that the Yosemite fire isn't putting them in damager, seriously parents are paranoid theses days. All 5 female office staffers are female. Store staff is 4 females. Events team that does boats, rock climbing, hiking and such this is 2/3, female/male. And after that the ratio on the other teams are pretty much equal. Then again the fact that there aren't very many male applicants might also add to the problem.
A guy I'm going to miss is Marcus my roommate. He had a really rough past with gangs, drugs, and the whole bit. After some stuff in his life he turned to Christ and is now one of the cooks at Calvin Crest. He has been a fun guy to hang around and his views on Christianity are unique to what I'm use to. I grew up in a fairly sheltered home and my parents did a good job at making sure I didn't get into too much trouble. Then to here the tale from the other side of the train tracks its really interesting. I know there were people like Marcus out in the world, but it was an honor to finally meet one of them. He is my no means perfect, he smokes, swears, and by all standards at times socially unexceptionable; however I would feel safest if I knew he was standing next to me in a dark alley. It was good to here is testimony and life story. He says he is a proud member of the Set Free Soldiers ministry that witnesses to bikers gangs and the tougher crowd of our country. Now you might have heard in the news about some of their members being arrested for a bar fight with Hell's Angels, but as far as Marcus nows the media is trying to take down a rough Christian organization. Its hard to tell what is going on in the world being up in the mountains, but for that kind of ministry I would say that ex-gang members would most certainly get in fights with their former friends. Either way, I don't really know what is going on so I won't try and make up facts.

Another thing I'm going to miss is the good weather and all the trees. For those of you who deal with 110 degree weather during the summer you know how thankful you are to spend some time out of the frying pan. Watching the wildlife around here. I think the squirrels up here are hilarious they'll do all kinds of crazy stuff. I saw one jump about ten feet from one tree to another. We have squirrels on the Fresno State campus, but they are lazy and not as entertaining to watch. The mosquitoes I'm not going to miss as well as the other small insects that view me as dinner.

Ackward moments up here are really funny looking back at them. So at Sherwood being hugged by little girls really awkward. I'm sure parents don't mind their children hugging them were they were little and there head just at that very awkward height. Its just... *sigh* so innocent and something that society had twisted in my mind to think is inappropriate. Also we have this stick shift vehicle that is really small and we have to all sit in the cab because of some stupid rule that we can't sit in the bed. So there are like 9 girls on my team like I said earlier and I'm 1 of 3 people that know how to drive stick. So her I am crammed into a small truck with girls and some of them are sitting in the middle. And what is in the middle the stick... and what makes thing worse is that most of them like to prop their legs on the dash board. So if my hand slips when I'm going into 2nd, 4th or Reverse it would hit there... yeah. Very awkward, and pretty much being the only guy on the team (the other two are never really helpful, on is a complete idiot the other is the year round staff guy and does special projects all summer.) So most of the girls get angry with "the guy" says his opinion of how to do things or is just there at all.

Well there isn't much left to tell... So now I'm off to school taking 3 Engineering Classes, 1 Philosophy class, 1 Physics class, and 1 Calculus class. So I got a full load and can't relax or else I could be in big trouble.